


The Hardest Science to Forget

by lindmere



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Movie Fusion, F/F, Inspired by a Movie, M/M, Memory Alteration, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-14
Updated: 2012-02-14
Packaged: 2017-10-31 03:36:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/339449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lindmere/pseuds/lindmere
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Modern-day AU based on Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, written for the Reel Love Rom-Com challenge at <a href="http://jim_and_bones.livejournal.com">jim_and_bones</a>. Boy meets boy, boy loses boy, boy gets his memory of the other boy erased at a sketchy Vulcan joint in the warehouse district.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hardest Science to Forget

**Author's Note:**

> Tremendous thanks for beta reading to the adorable and perspicacious [caitri](/users/caitri) , Keeper of Bones's Snark.

Valentine’s Day was invented by people in relationships to make the rest of us feel like crap.  
  
It’s not enough that they have love; the smug bastards need a national campaign to rub it in our faces. And there’s not a shred of honesty about it, because if you said “love is digging a splinter out of someone’s dirty heel even though the thought of hurting them makes your flesh crawl,” the poor bastards wouldn’t know what to make of it. So it’s either infantilized bullshit with chubby pink cupids crapping rainbows, or clichéd “romance” purchased with a credit card: a dozen mutant roses from the gas station, red satin underwear made by underpaid children, Double Suicide by Chocolate served with two forks by candlelight at your local snotty bistro.  
  
You know what an honest Valentine’s Day card would look like?  
  
 _Thank You, My Darling, for Fucking Me in the Mornings When My Breath is Bad  
This Valentine’s Day, I got you something special: an extra hour of sleep while I try to calm our screaming infant  
To My Sweetheart: You’re the Person Who Will Give a Shit When I Die_  
  
...but that’ll never happen, because it wouldn’t make the lonely people weep into pints of ice cream and buy tickets to movies about adorably awkward young people finding love in Manhattan. The funny thing is, it would work on me, but then I’m different: I’ve been there before.  
  
And so this Valentine’s Day starts with an email from Jocelyn. Just seeing her name--her new, not-married-to-me name--pop up on my phone makes my heart pound.  
  
 _Len--  
  
Hope you’re well. I got a call from St. Bridget’s saying they need another $500 for student activity fees. I thought you had it covered but I guess there was some confusion. It needs to be paid by Wednesday so Jo can go on a field trip. Can you call them today and straighten it out?  
  
Thanks,  
  
Joss_  
  
 _P.S. Happy Valentine’s Day. I hope you’re spending it with someone. Just don’t sit home and drink, because thinking about that makes me sad._  
  
That’s an arrow to the heart, alright, and there will be no raspberry truffles to staunch the bleeding. Instead, my day looks like this:  
  
 **Staff Physician Training Agenda - February 14**  
  
 **8:00** Continental Breakfast  
 **8:30** Welcoming remarks from Dr. M’Benga  
 **9:00** Overview of Electronic Medical Records Initiative at Piedmont Hospital  
….  
 **5:00** Closing remarks from Dr. M’Benga  
  
I could handle a day at the hospital, up to my chin in other people’s disasters. But this? Flowcharts. Cold cut buffets. _PowerPoint_.  
  
I wouldn’t be much of a doctor if I couldn’t fake a sick day, would I?  
  
One-handed, I type out an apologetic message to Dr. M’Benga, leaving out the capital letters so I’ll seem extra unwell. I get off at the next exit rand head in the opposite direction, and just keep going--past the outer suburbs, past the small perimeter towns, and finally to the Ocalee National Forest. I yank off my tie but keep the blazer, since the morning mist is a little cool. It’s not really hiking, but I wander the morning away, birds cocking their heads at the strange man in the middle of the woods in a navy blazer and loafers. Two squirrels chase each other around an around a tree.  
  
“You’re better off not catching her,” I say to squirrel #2. He ignores me. Thirty seconds of frantic squirrel sex follow, and then squirrel #1 wriggles away and runs off. I look around for the squirrel lawyer.  
  
Another hour and I’m in a Waffle House outside of Greensboro, sucking back coffee as if it could clear my head and pushing around a cold pecan waffle with my fork. It’s between breakfast and lunch and so the place is mostly empty, just a few retirees and people who have nowhere else to be--people like me, I guess.  
  
And _that_ guy.  
  
He sticks out like a sore thumb because he’s trying so hard not to look as pretty as he is. He’s got messy blond hair, candy pink lips, radiation blue eyes, and an ugly plaid shirt open over a graying T-shirt. He’s sitting sideways in the booth, feet in ratty Chuck Taylors dangling over the edge of the seat, but nothing about him says hipster or college kid or delinquent or anything else. He looks like nobody but himself. He’s vibrating with energy, eyes darting around the room, until, with the randomness of an atomic collision, they hit mine.  
  
He doesn’t do the lookaway like a straight guy would, but he doesn’t give me the cruisey stare, either. Instead he blinks at me, direct and curious, and the corners of his mouth quirk up, hopeful. An angler, and I’m a fat trout in shallow water. I tilt my head down with purpose and keep reading the _New York Times_ in five-word segments on my phone.  
  
After a few minutes, I chance a look up. He’s moved two booths closer. I give an involuntary shiver and clutch the phone more tightly.  
  
“Hi.”  
  
He’s popped up over the neighboring booth, both hands wrapped over the back of a seat like a Kilroy cartoon.  
  
“Uh, hi.” I give him a weak smile and immediately hate myself.  
  
 _Beg me for money_ , I think. _Ask me for drugs. Just don’t--_  
  
“Do you mind if I sit there?” He points to the seat opposite mine.  
  
“Knock yourself out.”  
  
He slides in with the music of jeans on vinyl and sits there, vibrating, apparently waiting for me to entertain him. I cast around, desperate; I am not an entertaining guy. He leans forward and the rolled cuff of his shirt slides up, revealing a tattoo on his wrist, a stylized sun.  
  
“Nice tat,” I say. And it _is_ nice, as much as pigment trapped in fibroblasts by an immune reaction can be.  
  
“Thanks.” He brushes it with his fingers like it’s still fresh and sore. “You hate tattoos, don’t you? You don’t get why somebody would take weird art they’d never have on their wall and put it on their body. You probably think the human body is enough of an art work, right?” I don’t know how he knows that, but I can’t disagree. “It’s not about art. Tattoos are like instant personality. Whatever you want to do--piss off your parents, make lovers think you’re dangerous and sexy, get strangers to talk to you about philosophy and life--you can get that in a tattoo. And then there’s the pain. Most people won’t say it but they get off on the fact that you’re willing to suffer for something that’s meaningful to you. Even though it’s a non-sexy procedure, just buzzing and wincing. Like the dentist. By the way, I’m Jim.”  
  
I stare at the hand he’s reached out to me while my neurons try to catch up. After a few stupid seconds I grip it. It’s large and dry and warm.  
  
“I’m Len.”  
  
“Len. Is that short for Lennox? Cool name. Are you going to eat that waffle?”  
  
“No, but it’s cold and disgusting.” He immediately yanks the plate toward him, grabs my fork, and glugs half a cup of syrup on it. “What the hell are you, a hummingbird?” It crosses my mind that he’s on something, but his hands are steady, his pupils aren’t dilated, and his color is good. Really good.  
  
“I have a fast metabolism.” The waffle disappears, washed down with some of my coffee, leaving his full lips shiny and sticky. Worse and worse. “Do you have a car, Len?”  
  
“In general? Yes,” I say, sensing danger in the question.  
  
“Great! Let’s go to Tybee Island. I love the beach in the off season. But the slacks won’t cut it. Do you have shorts with you?”  
  
“What, you want to go _now_? It’s a three-and-a-half hour drive, at least.”  
  
The blue eyes regard me with the same unsugarcoated kindness as my therapist. “You got anything better to do?”  
  
I think that the answer is “no,” and that I have a gym bag in my car, with shorts and a T-shirt and a towel.  
  
“I can kick in for gas,” Jim says, grabbing his backpack and slapping a couple of bucks on the table for a tip. His butt’s already half off the seat, a bird about to fly, with or without me. “C’mon. Are we going to do this thing?”  
  
 _No_ , the answer should be. _No no no no._  
  
“Yes.”  
  
By late afternoon we’re lying on a quilt on the nearly deserted beach, on white sand made damp and clean by the receding tide. The quilt is from my bed, a factory-made simulacrum of the priceless one my grandmother gave to Joss on our wedding day. It’s been in my trunk for a month waiting to be dry cleaned, and now it’s well and truly trashed. I couldn’t be happier.  
  
“Do you want another mochalattawhatever?” Jim rattles the ice in his empty cup like a maraca. He needs regular infusions of sugar and caffeine or he gases out. 

  
“How about some real food?” I say, and he nods enthusiastically. I reach for my wallet, but Jim waves me off and comes back a half hour later laden with grouper and sweet potato fries and pie, and won’t even let me pay my share. Maybe Jim doesn’t pay for it either; maybe he just gives that expectant half-smile that makes you want to do anything to please him, and people just hand over the goods.  
  
We watch a pink, clear sunset together, and eleven hours later we see an equally pearly sunrise. Yes, we spend the night on the beach, occasionally dozing but mostly talking. Somehow I never ask Jim where he’s from, or where he lives, or what he does--we’re too busy talking about the important stuff, like what’s the most overrated movie in history, pirates vs. ninjas (who would win?), what chances of dying you’d accept to go into space. My answer to that is easy.  
  
“None. Space is like football--you can see everything better on TV.”  
  
“Seriously?” Jim cranes his head around to stare at me. “I’d do it no matter what the risk. Best case, you’re a fucking _astronaut_ ; you get to be somewhere other than Earth. Can you even imagine that? Your friends would say, ‘Where’s Jim? Oh, right, he’s not on the planet right now.’ _Not on the planet._ And if you die, you’re famous--memorials and a eulogy from the president and shit. It’s a no-lose situation.”  
  
I look up at the stars and think that they might as well be Christmas lights. I’m just fine right here.  
  
He takes my hand; his own already feels as familiar to me as an old glove. “What are you thinking?” he says, and it doesn’t sound like a cliché. It sounds like he really wants to know.  
  
“That I’m happy. Really happy.” I mean it. I don’t if I’ve known I was definitely, positively happy since I was a kid, but I know it now.  
  
“Good,” he says, and gives my hand a squeeze. “That’s good.”  
  
Under the kind regard of a slowly warming day, we brush the sand out of our clothes, grab breakfast, and hit the road. It’s lucky it’s Saturday or I’d be out of a job and unable to care. Yes, I’m that far gone already: I know the symptoms, which include being happy about the fact that I’m at a truck stop outside of Savannah, filling the car and getting ready for a long drive on two hours sleep while the guy who did this to me snores in the passenger seat.  
  
Just before Macon, I nudge him. His chin’s deep in his chest and his uncombed hair is, objectively speaking, adorable.  
  
“Hey, where do you live?”  
  
He hugs his arms around himself and frowns, slides a pink tongue out to wet his salt-dried lips. “Inman Park. But is it okay if I sleep at your place? I think I’m having caffeine withdrawal. And since you’re a doctor--”  
  
My answering growl doesn’t even convince myself. I’m done, I’m toast, I’m crispy on both sides. Somewhere above the fluffy clouds, Cupid’s project manager is looking at a task called _Get Leonard McCoy to fall in love with a hyperactive drifter_ and marking it **Complete**.  
  
+++++  
  
“So, Len, do you and Jim have any ‘special plans’ for Valentine’s Day?” Lee’s eyebrows make the air quotes for her.  
  
Lee Inouye is my immediate superior, but that doesn’t give her any right to pry into my love life. She’s only met Jim a handful of times when he’s materialized at happy hours and holiday parties, and she can’t shut up about what a handsome couple we are, and how happy we look, and how second time’s the charm. It’s like she’s personally invested in my relationship, like if anything went wrong kittens would cry and romance would die out in the world.  
  
Which is unfortunate, because I haven’t talked to Jim in five days.  
  
“Oh, you know, nothing special,” I say, slopping burnt coffee into my mug. It’s going to be hell on my stomach, but I haven’t been sleeping and I need the boost. “Dinner. A movie, maybe.”  
  
“Hope you’ve made a reservation,” she says, adding with a wink, “or maybe you’re just as happy staying in.”  
  
I give her a weak smile and dump two big spoons into the coffee. Two hours later my shift’s over and I bolt out of the hospital still jittery, and not just from the caffeine.  
  
I grip the wheel like my hands have to wrestle control of it away from my brain. I’m going home. Not to Janice and Chris’s, not to Madras Palace (although I could really go for some of their pakoras right now) and certainly not to Grant Park. _Home_.  
  
I’m halfway there before my hands lose the battle and I make a U-turn in the middle of the street, almost side swiping a parked car. Damn it.  
  
For the last three months Jim has worked at a bike shop near Grant Park, which is a month longer than he’s worked anywhere else, as far as I can tell. His M.O. is to apply for low-wage, medium-glamor jobs whether he’s qualified or not, smile at the interviewers until they say “yes,” and then crush their low expectations to dust by becoming competent to the point of indispensability. Then, he quits for vague, knee-jerk reasons. _That guy was pissing me off. It wasn’t enough responsibility. I got bored._  
  
In hindsight, I guess that pattern ought to have made me cautious.  
  
The shop is called Tough Nutz and sells fat tire bikes with names like Monster and Ninja. During the week, the shop is a mellow flow of CamelBak-toting young urbanites who are happy to pay $2000 to have Jim pat the wheel of some death machine and say, “You’re going to hit the side of that mountain like the fist of an angry god.” They’d be transformed, on the spot, from customer service reps and paralegals into fearless warriors. Jim had that power; it worked on even the most timid.  
  
Even on me.  
  
It took me a couple of months to believe he wouldn’t just vanish in a cloud of empty Red Bull cans and cupcake crumbs, and another couple to believe he actually enjoyed talking with me and not just taking contrary positions because he liked to see me get worked up. He was an energy drink in human form with a mind as deep as the ocean and changeable as the sky. But when I broached the subject of college or technical training or even--God forbid--the military, I got a cold stare and a pugnacious jawline. Jim, who could talk about any subject for hours, would clam up, or sneer and say, “I’m not your _project_. I’m not your rentboy diamond-in-the-rough. I’m _happy_ the way I am, and who’d know that better than me? _You_?”  
  
“I pity your parents,” I said once, and he was gone, out the door and somewhere beyond the reach of cell phones. Then he came back three hours later with a full grocery bag and started making chili like nothing had happened.  
  
The last time, though, he didn’t come back. Hasn’t returned my calls, or my texts, or my email. I feel like a god-damned stalker, especially now, when I slip in the open door of Tough Nutz and keep my head down, pretending to browse, while Jim and the other clerk wait on customers.  
  
Of course Jim’s customer is young and pretty. Of course he has to help her adjust her new purchase, kneeling like a prince to slip her tiny cleat-shod foot into the pedals while she wiggles her perfect little peach of a behind just above his head.  
  
Just then he looks up, his eyes meet mine, and my heart stops.  
  
“Hi,” he says. “Give me just another minute, I’ll be right with you.”  
  
Well, that was easy. The slow walkback I’d planned in my mind--a talk outside, maybe coffee, dinner, negotiation, apology--melt away along with the tension in my upper back. In another hour we could be in my living room, in another three in my bed, and an unspecified time after that I could be getting my first decent sleep in a week.  
  
Jim turns his attention back to his customer. “That’s good enough for now. I can make more adjustments on the trail if you need them. We still on for this weekend? Steeplechase Loop?” His hand slides up from her ankle to her calf.  
  
“Try and stop me,” she says, giving her sporty braids a toss. The look they exchange makes it clear that five miles of mud, rubber and possibly busted teeth are going to be just so much foreplay before the main event.  
  
Jim stands up slowly, adjusting his jeans, and puts on his best, bright customer-service smile.  
  
“Sorry to keep you waiting, sir. How can I help you?”  
  
 _Sir_. Cold, so very cold, to make me listen to him arrange a date, and then to treat me like any other customer. It makes me freshly angry again that he can invent his own rules, not tell me about them, and then levy the stiffest possible penalties. It’s shockingly cruel. The knot in my stomach moves to my throat and I try to beat it to the punch, opening my mouth to say something, and then I see it.  
  
His eyes are blank, nothing behind them but pleasant semi-interest, most of his big brain taking a vacation, leaving just enough behind to make a commission off some eco-trendy businessman who genuinely believes he’s going to ride a bike to work. No recognition, no acknowledgement, as if I hadn’t sewn a button back onto the very shirt he’s wearing now.  
  
I have just enough presence of mind to mumble something about doing more research online, and then I get the hell out of there, before my head explodes all over the pricey nylonwear.  
  
+++++  
  
“It was like he’d never seen me before in his life. Like I was a complete stranger.” I’ve said a hundred permutations of this in the last half hour, and it’s still not making any sense. I’m not angry or indignant so much as freaked the fuck out.  
  
Janice just nods and pours more Kahlua into my coffee--it’s the strongest thing she’s got in the house.  
  
“Maybe it was his way of trying to make a clean break. You know, why argue if he’s already decided he wants to go? Maybe he was trying not to hurt you.” Even sweet, optimistic Janice--who’d tell you that a strangler was doing you a favor by keeping blood off your carpet--is having a hard time spinning this.  
  
“Or maybe he just wanted to see what it looked like if he ran over my heart with a Kevlar tire.” There are track marks; I can feel them. But romantic grief always sounds ridiculous in real life.  
  
Janice sighs into her cocoa and exchanges a look with Christine, who’s sitting at the kitchen table painting a birdhouse to look like a Swiss chalet.  
  
“What’s with the birdhouse?” I say. “You live in an apartment.”  
  
“It’s for the farm,” she says with a straight face. Janice is a cube-dwelling administrator at the hospital and Christine’s an R.N. Between them they barely make enough to afford a two-bedroom, but Christine has been talking about buying a goat farm for years, even though Janice is a city girl born with an iced mocha in her hand. The copy of _Progressive Dairy Farmer_ on the coffee table is a reminder that successful relationships seem to thrive on fiction.  
  
“I hope the birds can afford the mortgage,” I say, and go back to sulking, which feels better with an audience. Because I _am_ miserable, damn it, and I don’t know what to do to make it better.  
  
“We should tell him,” Christine says, and Janice waves her pink-manicured hands frantically.  
  
“No, don’t! He’s not going to--”  
  
“Tell me what?” Janice and Christine are having an argument with their eyes. Apparently Chris wins, because she wipes her hands and picks up her iPad and hands it to me.  
  
“I got this email today,” she says.  
  
 _Subject: James Kirk re: Leonard McCoy  
  
Dear Friend/Colleague/Family Member:  
  
JAMES KIRK has forgotten LEONARD MCCOY. Please do not mention Mr. McCoy’s name in Mr. Kirk’s presence.  
  
Thank you,  
  
Ji Yi Institute_  
  
“What the hell does _this_ mean?” It makes no sense. It makes the opposite of sense. “Is it some kind of joke? What’s the Ji Yi Institute?”  
  
Christine gives me a pitying look and taps a couple more times on the iPad. The Ji Yi Institute has a website, all soothing beige and bamboo leaves and vague references to _meditative memory therapies_ and herbs. It’s like a parody, part of some sick, fake conspiracy that reveals unimagined depths of creative cruelty in Jim, because to go this far to--  
  
“Hey,” Janice says, having reached over to click on the _Contact_ tab of the website. “They have an office in Lakewood.”  
  
My madness has an address, and it can be Googled. I’m halfway out the door and Christine, ever practical, is yelling, “Len, wait! That’s not a great neighborhood after dark, and they won’t be open.”  
  
I don’t care, I want to see it. Nothing seems real right now; maybe nothing has been since that golden morning a year ago. I want my life back. No, I want _Jim_ back, but I’ll settle for my life. Bland as it was, it’s better than this.  
  
+++++  
  
The address turns out to be a squat brick building on Tidewater Avenue, and I disbelieve that it’s anything but a cheap furniture store until I see the discreet brass sign on the door: _Ji Yi Institute_. If it’s a joke, it’s going pretty damn far.  
  
It’s 9 PM and it should be closed like Chris said, but there’s light leaking from the back, just visible through the glass doors, and so I ring the bell. After a few minutes a dark figure comes to the door without turning on the lights in the lobby. All I can see is glossy black hair reflecting the street lights. The figure cracks the door open.  
  
“Yes?” He’s got that psychiatrist’s inflection in his voice, questioning and presuming at the same time.  
  
“Are you one of the Ji Yi people? A friend of mine got an email. I want an explanation.”  
  
“Do you have an appointment?” He’s maddeningly calm when he ought to be intimidated by a large-ish stranger in a leather jacket in a so-so part of town.  
  
“ _No_ , I don’t have an appointment. I have no idea who you are or what you do.”  
  
He tilts his head, considering. “I am Spock, and I believe you are Dr. Leonard McCoy. I’ve seen your photograph. Perhaps you ought to come in.”  
  
He leads me through the dark lobby and into the back, which is bland as any low-rent medical office, with the addition of some watercolors of cherry blossoms and cranes and one of those tabletop waterfalls. When he ushers me into an office and flips on the lights, I see that he’s donned a black Fedora, which is puzzling and makes him look vaguely Rabbinical.  
  
“Please sit down, Doctor. May I offer you some tea?”  
  
“No, thanks. A god-damned explanation will do fine.”  
  
He slides noiselessly into a leather armchair behind the desk and steeples his fingers, a familiar gesture that makes me want to call the American Medical Association and report him, because if this character isn’t some pseudoscience-peddling charlatan, I’ll eat my (or his) hat.  
  
“Dr. McCoy, the Institute provides services to those wishing to forget. Persons and companion animals are the most common--the dead or departed, or those our clients would prefer never to have met--but specific incidents are not uncommon: an embarrassing moment, a childhood trauma, even a particular fact. I had a client recently who had discovered that red food coloring is derived from beetles, and found that that fact interfered with her enjoyment of many foods, notably Red Velvet Cake. I cannot guarantee that clients will not re-learn the same information, of course, but we take reasonable precautions, such as the email I sent to your friend.”  
  
“That’s impossible. You know that, right?” I’m suddenly desperate for confirmation that this is a scam, which would at least make some kind of sense. “There’s been research on erasing specific traumatic memories in mice, but not humans. _Mice_ , damn it!”  
  
“Indeed. But our techniques do not require biochemical intervention.” His eyes are dark, glittering, and direct, and it’s deeply disturbing because he’s so _earnest_.  
  
“What, then? If you say ‘ancient Chinese wisdom’ I’m going to have to smack you. I’ve noticed you aren’t Chinese, by the way.”  
  
“Through direct contact of minds. Specifically, the theoretical construct of quantum pseudo-telepathy--”  
  
“ _Horsehockey_. Every huckster on the planet uses that ‘quantum’ crap to hand-wave the impossible. Quantum mechanics is an _actual branch of physics_ , and it’s got nothing to do with forgetting about your dead cat.”  
  
“In general I agree, although quantum theory as currently posited contains notable errors.” I have no choice but to roll my eyes at that. “However, as is often the case in science, it is unnecessary to understand the underlying construct in order to derive value from the application. In this case, I am confident enough that I offer a 100% money-back guarantee.”  
  
“By God, I hate you quacks like poison. There’s nothing about you that’s any different from any huckster I’ve ever met. Except maybe the hat.”  
  
“Fees are held in an online cash escrow account established with a disposable account,” he continues, ignoring me. “We erase the memory of this account along with the other undesirable memories. If we are unsuccessful, it is a simple matter to retrieve the money. Otherwise, there is no trace of an interaction with the Ji Yi Institute to trigger the client’s memory.”  
  
“‘We’. You mean ‘you’.” I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that this sallow fraud has had his hands--literally or figuratively--on Jim, and it fills me with pity and a desire to punch Spock in his aquiline nose. Jim may not be college-educated but he’s bright as a penny, and only desperation make him pay some shady character to hypnotize him or give him Rohypnol or a whack on the head or whatever snake oil this Mr. Spock is selling. I have to figure out what his game is, and then get Jim to take his money back, and hopefully me with it.  
  
“All right then, fine,” I say, trying with all my might to make my face look like I believe him. “If there’s no risk, then I’d like to try it myself. Jim’s forgotten me, huh? I want to forget him back.” I don’t, of course, not as long as there’s still a chance, and I probably wouldn’t even if I thought Jim were never coming back. But to be able to sequester him, to not think of him when I look at every damn thing and every damn place, not to have to remember him on Valentine’s Day but maybe some time safe, like Groundhog Day or when my taxes are due--it’s tempting. I understand why poor saps take their sorrows to the Ji Yi Institute.  
  
“Very good.” He begins shuffling papers, a good act, not at all like a con artist who’s just found an easy mark. “Here is a consent form, and the escrow information. You will need to remove all items associated with Mr. Kirk from your home and car and place them in marked boxes or trash bags. All salvageable items will be donated to charity; the rest will be destroyed. The digital record presents a larger challenge; we recommend simply creating new email and social networking accounts. And we will require a list of all mutual acquaintances with their email addresses.”  
  
“Sure, fine.” I grab a pen off the desk and begin filling out forms. “How much will it cost?”  
  
“Two thousand dollars per year of acquaintance for humans. Five hundred for pets.”  
  
“Lord have mercy.” After just one year, I guess we’re relative bargains, but I think of Jim earning $10 an hour for his bright smiles. Poor Jim. But I’ve got money in the bank and I know lawyers, so-- “Okay, okay. How soon can we do this? Tonight?”  
  
The corners of Spock’s mouth turn down, the closest thing I’ve seen to an expression on his face. “You will have to call tomorrow and arrange it with the scheduler. Two weeks’ notice is generally sufficient, but this is our busiest time of year.”  
  
All right, so it’s not like a huckster to turn down instant cash. But still. “What if I throw in a 50% rush fee? Could you do it tonight?”  
  
“Impossible, I fear. I already have two bookings--”  
  
“And I don’t spend tomorrow morning reporting you to the AMA and the Better Business Bureau. I’m not on it, but I understand that Facebook can be quite effective, too.”  
  
One eyebrow tilts up, and the corners of his mouth twitch. “Perhaps I can fit you in. However, it will be quite late--3 AM at the earliest. And you must still complete all the preparatory steps; otherwise, the probability is high that you will not be satisfied with the results.”  
  
“Oh, I’m sure I’ll be _very_ satisfied with the results.” I’ve never been so happy to cheated in my life.  
  
+++++  
  
It’s midnight and I’m running around my apartment throwing things into cardboard boxes:  
  
A refrigerator magnet from Stu’s Gator Shack (two alligators fornicating and the slogan “C’mon back, we can always make more!”).  
  
A paper crown from a pancake restaurant in Athens (fake jewels and _I Rule_ scrawled in crayon by Jim).  
  
A birthday card: “Feliz cumpleaños para mi novia” (Jim was only just starting to learn Spanish).  
  
A paperback copy of _The Fortress of Solitude_ (KIRK written in marker along the edge because one of his co-workers is a kleptomaniac).  
  
At least ten things with the Tough Nutz logo emblazoned on them (because after all this time Jim still thinks it’s funny).  
  
I look at this collection of effluvia and wonder why none of it seems solid or significant. That would have come eventually, I hope: marriage and permanence, hard metal bands and the Law. Not impossible to dissolve, but requiring effort and forethought. From here, my time with Jim looks like a weekend at a second-rate resort, quickly forgotten when the hangover wears off and you vacuum the sand out of your car. But these bits of junk aren’t Jim, they’re signifiers, pointers to the location in my brain where the memory is kept. I see, I smile, I remember, until time smears them with the back of its hand into _Oh, him? Some guy I used to date._  
  
Between the ridiculous busy work and nerves, I can’t sleep and I don’t try to. There’s a soft knock on the door at 3 AM precisely and Spock enters, grave and somber as a vampire. I’m not worried on a primal safety level: Spock is pasty and narrow-shouldered and I’m 99 percent sure I could take him down if it came to that. I’m just not sure how it will play out--if I’ll get a good show for my two grand, or if it will just be embarrassing, like the time that Janice invited her friend the “pet psychic” over, and she’d waved her palms over the head of a disgruntled tabby and said he’d been the Duchess of Polignac’s cat in a past life and that his hairballs were caused by trauma from the Revolution.  
  
“Please seat yourself in a comfortable chair,” Spock says, keeping the black Fedora on. “This will take approximately one hour.”  
  
He has no psychoelectromothingamajigs, no herbal concoctions or tin cans connected with twine. He merely dims the lights and pulls up a hassock, tenting his fingers, elbows on knees, a look of intense concentration on his face. I have no idea what’s coming--in the frantic shuffle of paper and objects, I’d neglected to read the information sheet--and it’s a strangely intimate place to be in with someone I hate at 3 AM on a Tuesday morning.  
  
He stretches long, pale fingers toward my face and whispers, “My mind to your mind--”  
  
His dark eyes fill my vision, turning briefly to a desert landscape of red rock and heat haze, and after that there’s nothing in my mind but _Jim_ \--  
  
 _...Jim walking so close to the edge of Tallulah Gorge that I’m afraid to breathe, even to tell him to move the hell back, but he grins and looks down and then back at me and yells, “Hey! Toss me your phone and I’ll take a photo!”....  
  
….Jim with a very well-researched fake migraine headache, sneaking into rooms and violating all sorts of protocols, all with the goal of giving me a blow job at work but getting fascinated with the MRI machine instead (“Those are some _ big fucking magnets _!”)....  
  
….Jim’s lips on the inside of my thigh, finding a spot that makes the world narrow to nothing else but his warm mouth and wet tongue, on the knife edge between laughing and shouting, cock so hard I can barely move....  
  
….Jim dismantling a lobster with medical precision, making me wonder where a broke kid learned a skill like that, before I get distracted when his fine hands dip the claw in melted butter and he sucks out the meat....  
  
…..Jim in the booth at the Waffle House, backpack in his lap, phone in one hand and a book in the other, free of sin and history, as if he’d been waiting there every one of his 25 years just for me to arrive..._  
  
On Tybee Island, the tide is rising, washing away the meandering footprints of gulls and winter visitors. The dry palm fronds rustle and it sounds like a whisper--  
  
“ _Forget_.”  
  
+++++  
  
It’s 3 AM and I have a headache and I just want to go to back to bed, so of course Jim wants to talk. His breath smells like alcohol and artificial vanilla (cotton candy vodka, disgusting). He can’t shut up about _how awesome_ the party was, and how I should have been there, though nothing would have stamped LOSER on my forehead faster than acting as a Brinks guard for my boyfriend at a house party for kids 10 years younger than me.  
  
“You should have seen the way she looked at me when I said that.” His voice is slurred, 15 decibels too loud. “She has those big brown doll eyes, and they were like, _wahhhh_ ”--he pushes his own long lashes apart with his fingers, and Leonard seriously hopes he doesn’t stick one in his eye. “Fuck, I thought she was going to knee me in the groin but she just laughed. Her boyfriend, though--” Jim’s index finger roams around, trying to find the point of the story--” _he_ looked like he wanted to choke me out. At least I think it was her boyfriend; she let him put his hand on her ass.”  
  
“Then I guess everybody at the party was _your_ boyfriend.” It’s mean, but damn it, I’m pissed: he should have let me know where he was, and he shouldn’t have driven; it’s completely irresponsible.  
  
Jim pushes himself back up to sea level in his chair and squints at me. “What does _that_ mean?”  
  
“Just that I assume you followed your usual strategy for making friends in a room full of strangers.” His forehead is creasing, but something hard is rising up inside me, and I can’t stop it. “You said you were going to bring salsa, but it’s still in the fridge. That girl--did she get the special Jim Kirk party favor?”  
  
“Excuse me, _what_?” He’s upright and looking directly at me. “Cut the cute metaphors and spit it out.”  
  
Too late now to turn back; _you said you were going to jump off that cliff, now do it_. “I’m saying that I assume you fucked her, Jim. Isn’t that how you get people to like you?”  
  
I’ve never seen eyes that blue and cold. Suddenly he’s dead sober and I have a feeling of _oh, shit_ , like he might punch me even though he’s never done any such thing.  
  
“Fine. Okay. Thanks for explaining that.” He’s pacing, back and forth, like he’s trying to gather escape velocity. “I’m glad that endless, fucking _boring_ discussion about a negotiated, open relationship didn’t keep you from thinking I’m a slut. Because I’d hate to deny you that pleasure.”  
  
“I wasn’t saying--”  
  
“Yes, you were. God _damn_ , you love your moral judgements, sitting there with your 1.75 ounces of Bourbon and your fucking _Atlantic Monthly_ and knowing exactly what everybody should be doing with their lives.” He pulls his keys from his pocket, works the last one off the ring, and slaps it down on the side table. “Here. I won’t be needing this any more.” He grabs his backpack, the one he dropped on the floor when he came home 15 minutes ago and heads for the door.  
  
“Jim, wait, I’m sorry, I--” I scramble after him, dodging furniture, but he’s already slipping away. The door opens and I chase him into the hall, but he evaporates like some insubstantial spirit. “Wait!”  
  
I hear a dog bark out on the street, and it means goodbye.  
  
+++++  
  
“Can’t we just stay in and have brunch?” Through a crack in the curtains I can see brilliant November sky, but I’m still in my PJs and happy about it.  
  
“ _Brunch_? Could there _be_ a bigger stereotype? If you make Bellinis, will Cher come over? God.” He twitches, like his clothes are itching him. “I need air; it smells like grandparents in here.” He knees my leg. “Farmer’s Market, now. Let’s go.”  
  
He’s better in the sunshine with an iced coffee in his hand and a smile on his face.  
  
“I love this neighborhood. We should buy a house here.”  
  
“Sure. All we need to do is sell your comic book collection for $1.5 million.”  
  
“I’m _serious_.” He whacks me on the shoulder, almost spilling my coffee. “It’s a great time to buy; the housing market is still fucked. I can’t contribute much to the down payment, but I’m great at fixing shit, so that’s sweat equity. I’m sick of apartments; mine has no hot water after 10 AM and the guy upstairs tap dances or something. I want a real house, with a lawn and squirrels and shit.”  
  
I have no idea where this sudden domesticity is coming from, but it makes me nervous. I’ve been thinking about asking Jim to move into the condo, but it’s part of a bigger, better-thought-out but unbroached plan that includes supporting Jim while he goes back to school.  
  
“Having a house is like having a kid--a big, demanding, expensive kid that springs a leak in its water heater on Christmas Day. You want to mow a lawn? Go work for a lawn care company.”  
  
“Because that’s all I’m good for, right? And I’ve got a mental age of 12 so I don’t understand about mortgages and points and homeowners’ insurance.” The caffeinated words tumble out almost too fast to hear, and I know this is going nowhere good. “I have savings. They’re going to make me weekend manager at the shop and you _know_ I could get a programming job any time I want, so fuck that shit. But maybe it’s not the money. Maybe it’s the moving in together. Is that your problem?”  
  
“No, not at all.” I’m sweating, even though it’s barely 60 degrees out. “I want to do that, it’s just-- you get these ideas in your head, and you’re enthusiastic about them, but they don’t last. The programming thing? You haven’t touched your laptop except to check email in a month. You master things so quickly, it’s like you squeeze all the juice out and throw them away and move on to the next thing. A house--”  
  
“Fuck a house,” he practically spits, eyes narrow and cold. “Fuck you, too, if you think I’m a pretty boy with the attention span of a flea who can’t function in the world. I was doing fine before I met you. I managed to pay bills and ride mass transit and everything. You know, maybe I should prove it.” His voice keeps rising, drawing stares. “Maybe I should dump you, right here at the Farmer’s Market. And then you can get some _fucking_ organic milk for your _fucking_ fair trade coffee and go right back to your _fucking_ predictable life, minus the fucking.”  
  
“Damn it, I don’t-- Jim, I never--” I give up trying to slip a word in between the narrow gaps in his rant, and put my hands up in surrender. Jim’s angry voice turns into shrieking, metallic background music for the swirling colors, pyramids of oranges and people in jackets and somewhere in there is Jim, but I can’t---  
  
+++++  
  
“How’s the Massaman curry?” It’s weird that Jim is asking; usually if he wants to know, he just grabs a bite off my plate. But tonight he’s listless, gassed out from work or from a long gym session. I know it can’t be sparkling conversation and sly glances every night, but it makes me feel bad, as if Jim feels obligated to sit here making small talk because I’m buying dinner.  
  
“Not bad. I think I’m going to stick with the Pad King next time, though.”  
  
“Good old, predictable Bones.” It’s one of his nicknames for me, something he got off a TV show. “You don’t like the curry, but you’re not going to ditch it and order what you want because it would be a waste, and because you’re stubborn. You don’t like the idea that you’ve ordered the same thing 30 times in a row at the same restaurant, so it’s worth eating something you don’t like every now and then to prove to yourself that you’re not entirely a creature of habit.”  
  
“Am I really that bad?” It’s depressingly plausible. I stir the rice into the pool of sauce with my chopsticks and feel my appetite leech away. “No wonder we have nothing to talk about.”  
  
“Oh, there’s plenty, but you won’t talk about it.” He leans back and tucks his hands in his armpits, looking engaged for the first time that night. “Your father’s illness. Your divorce. Why you won’t get on an airplane. And yet, I know in excruciating detail why the 1959 Rebels were the best Ole Miss team ever.”  
  
“I don’t hide things from you, damn it,” I say, inadvertently (okay, maybe on purpose) implying that he does. “Those things just aren’t interesting.”  
  
“They are to me.”  
  
Before I can reply, a young, dark-haired man appears beside the table.  
  
“Jim. I am sorry to interrupt your dinner, but I wished to thank you for that book recommendation.” He’s a nice-looking kid in a nerdy kind of way, wearing a sweater that’s heavy for the season and a wool watch cap pulled down down low on his head. “I found the subject matter engaging.”  
  
“Sure, no problem.” There’s a pause during which Jim does not introduce me. “Well, enjoy your dinner. I recommend the Massaman curry.”  
  
“Thank you.” He inclines his head like a benediction. “I hope you and Bones enjoy your evening as well.”  
  
“Who _is_ that?” I hiss, as soon as he’s gone. “And how did he know you call me ‘Bones’?”  
  
“Dunno. Some guy from the bike shop. Or the gym, I’m not sure. Don’t worry about it.”  
  
And I really don’t have anything to worry about: not the curry, which is vanishing from my plate, or the restaurant, which is vanishing as well. I look at Jim in alarm but his face is vanishing, too, turned pink and blank as if with a pencil eraser. I seem to be the only thing that isn’t melting away, but I grab onto my own arms just to be sure.  
  
“ _Bones!_ ”  
  
Jim’s voice is a red-shifted echo, as if he’s been blasted to the stars.  
  
“Jim!”  
  
I remember now. I remember, I remember. The Ji Yi Institute and the cramped office, and against all probability it’s _working_. That black-haired bastard is taking Jim away from me.  
  
“Stop! I don’t want to do this any more! I want to stop! Keep the money, I don’t care--”  
  
It’s like shouting into the wind, into a howling void that’s pulling everything away and leaving only me behind.  
  
+++++  
  
“Good morning.”  
  
Leonard opens his eyes to find Jim’s face a few inches away, bathed in caramel-colored light. He’s pulled the sheet over their heads, but he must have opened the curtains first, because Leonard likes to sleep in the pitch dark.  
  
“Hey.” Leonard’s voice is morning-raspy; Jim dehydrated him pretty thoroughly the night before.  
  
“Hey yourself,” Jim says. He puts a hand on Leonard’s hipbone, warm and firm, and then gives it a little shake, trying to get Leonard’s drowsy attention. “Question for you: If I could pull back this sheet, and we could be anywhere in the world, where would you want us to be?”  
  
Leonard suspects where this is going. Jim has gotten it into his head to try big-wave surfing, which would involve two things Leonard hates, apocalyptic waves and flying in airplanes. Leonard’s suggestion of Cocoa Beach or waiting for a hurricane has gotten the _Fuck me but you’re old and boring_ eye roll.  
  
“Where would I want to be? Let me see.” Leonard draws it out, because now Jim’s hand is stroking his hip, and Jim is beautiful, face as innocent as a kid at a sleepover. “Anywhere in the world? Okay, I know. I want to be here, right now. This is the place I want to be.”  
  
Jim lights up like the Fourth of July. He loves praise, but not for anything that comes easily to him--his looks or his athleticism or the way machines swoon into obedience in his hands. He loves to make Leonard happy, and Leonard loves him back for it, because selflessness isn’t a natural habit for either one of them.  
  
“You know the best part?” Jim says after a while, hand making a beeline for Leonard’s groin. “No sharks.”  
  
+++++  
  
“I received your text message,” Spock says, pointing at his phone that way he does, as if he disbelieves that technology is going to work. “Your request was urgent. May I aid you in any way?”  
  
Jim isn’t distressed, he’s half frantic, crawling out of his skin with a need to be anywhere other than here. No, somewhere specific. “Sorry to bug you at work, I just--” He rubs his own arms briskly, trying to get rid of the feeling of _wrong wrong wrong_. “I feel like I’m falling apart. I mean literally, like pieces of me are flaking off. I don’t want to be alone, and I don’t want to be here. Let’s go to Greensboro. No! Let’s go to Tybee Island.”  
  
“A fine suggestion,” Spock says, with that voice like velvet sandpaper. He’s so unflappable, so calmingly measured in his response to everything, letting Jim be as emotional as he wants. “I believe I have no obligations next weekend.”  
  
“No, _now_. Let’s go now. I really need to lie on a quilt on the beach and look at the stars.”  
  
Spock tilts his head, considering, as if it’s no less irrational than any of Jim’s impulsive suggestions. “Very well. If you think it will alleviate your distress.”  
  
Hours later he’s lying on Bones' grandmother’s quilt, cooling sand firm and supportive under his aching back. It’s alright now, though; Bones has his hand wrapped around Jim’s, and he can _feel_ that it’s beautiful. Everything about Bones is beautiful.  
  
“I’m happy,” Bones whispers. There’s no one to hear, but Jim understands; the quiet is church-like, just wind and surf and the occasional creaking of palm leaves. “I’m so happy. If I died right now, I’d be completely satisfied with my life.”  
  
It brings tears to Jim’s eyes, because even though he’s known Bones for less than a day, he can tell that this is a profound admission, that Bones lives his life in judgement and expectation. Jim is proud he can give that to Bones, and hopeful about what it means for their relationship. Just once, he’d like to leave somebody better than he found them. Or maybe not leave at all.  
  
A wave crashes on the shore, and it’s followed by silence. Complete silence, and the sand is spilling away beneath them  
  
“No!” Bones shouts, and clutches tight at Jim’s hand. “Not this one!”  
  
“What is it? What’s going on?” The quilt under Jim starts bucking like a mule.  
  
Bones looks around in horror at the scenery, disappearing as if a giant child were putting away its play set. “It’s Spock. I hired him to take away my memories of you, but I don’t want to give up this one. We have to do something. We have to hide you.”  
  
“Where?” In a few moments there’ll be nowhere left to hide.  
  
“I don’t know. He’s seen all my memories of you, if this is the last one, the first one--”  
  
“Then take me somewhere where I’ve never been. Some time. The past.” Jim tries to keep his voice calm in order to not freak out Bones, but he can feel himself being ripped inexorably away. He keeps a death grip around Bones’ wrist. “Think of some other time. Do it _now_.”  
  
“Okay, okay.” Bones’ hair has fallen into his face and he’s shaking, but his attention turns inward.  
  
A moment later, it begins to rain.  
  
“Is this--” Jim begins.  
  
“ _Shut up_ ,” Bones whispers fiercely. “Let me concentrate.”  
  
A second later Jim crashes through a door and he’s in a large kitchen, all cherry wood and mirror-black surfaces. He pulls the collar of his wet jacket down from where it’s been keeping his head dry. The kitchen is warm and smells great, and the island in the middle is covered with platters of fancy snacks.  
  
“Hey, it worked,” he says, and makes a grab for something wrapped in bacon.  
  
Bones smacks his hand away. “Don’t. My mom will notice.”  
  
Jim starts to scowl, but then gets a good look at Bones. “Holy shit! Look at you--you’re fucking _adorable_. The khakis and the floppy hair--you’re like a GAP commercial come to life!”  
  
“I remember this evening,” Bones says, though Jim is having a hard time concentrating on anything but his beestung lips. “My parents were having a party and they gave me $20 to help with the dishes and stuff. Jocelyn came over to talk me into going to the mall. She borrowed her brother’s car, even though she only had her learner’s permit.”  
  
“Oh, a bad girl--I like her already. Who am I supposed to be?”  
  
“You’re my friend Tyler. We’re on the squash team together, and you came over to keep me company.”  
  
Jim looks down at his left pec. “Then why am I wearing a bowling shirt that says ‘Bogdan’?”  
  
“You got it at a vintage store. It’s your favorite thing.”  
  
“Are we dating? Because I really, really want to make out with you right now.”  
  
“Well, we-- a few times, but-- Jocelyn. Jocelyn and I are kind of pre-engaged, I guess. We’re leaving for college this fall.” Leonard keeps his eyes on the swinging door to the kitchen; the sounds of adult revelry--clinking glasses and baritone laughter--are making him nervous.  
  
Jim is doing his usual no-personal-boundaries inspection of a new place, peering into the built-in fridge, running a finger over the granite countertop.  
  
“This kitchen is bigger than my apartment. You never mentioned your family was rich.”  
  
“They’re not, not really. Not compared to some of the kids I go to school with. Tyler’s getting a Corvette for graduation.”  
  
“I hope it gets him laid, because the shirt ain’t working.”  
  
There’s a tap on the door, and before Leonard can stop him, Jim’s gone to let in Jocelyn, and there are the two most important people he’s ever let into his life, standing face to face.  
  
Jocelyn is wearing black leggings under a long, belted shirt and her brother’s leather jacket, which means he’s probably already passed out in his room from drinking coconut rum. Her long chestnut hair hangs on either side of her face, defiantly glossy in spite of the worst assaults of temporary hair dye. Her face is pale and serious and she thinks that she’s still growing into her nose, which, to Leonard’s eyes, is perfect.  
  
“Hi,” she says, giving Leonard a twitch of a smile, and then turns to Jim. “What are _you_ doing here?”  
  
“Just hanging out.” The bastard strikes a pose, presumably so his stone-washed jeans will show his package to best advantage. “You look hot, Jocelyn.”  
  
Jocelyn shoots him a look of withering disdain. “Len and I are going to the mall. Tricia’s working at Swiss Pretzels and the 27 toppings are starting to talk to her. I’m bringing her the Holy Mixtape of Antioch to cheer her up.” Leonard knows it well; it’s a bit Chili Peppers heavy (Leonard isn’t a fan) but otherwise solid. “Let’s go, before my brother wakes up and thinks about calling over here.”  
  
“I can’t,” Leonard says, trying to ignore the way Jim is looking at Jocelyn, like a cartoon character at a roast turkey. “My folks are paying me to pick up dirty glasses and stuff. My dad will be super pissed if I leave.”  
  
Jocelyn gives an existential shrug. “I can’t fix your daddy issues for you, Len. Work it out. I’ll wait in the car for 10 minutes, and then I’m out of here.” She turns on a chunky boot heel and exits.  
  
“Oh my God,” Jim says, breathless. “She _amazing_. No wonder you’re so fucked up. How did you screw the pooch on _that_?”  
  
“I realized I was _gay_ , you idiot.” Leonard realizes he’s half-shouting and looks at the swinging door in panic.  
  
“Oh, right. Did you ever go through a bi phase? Because Jocelyn’s got a car, and we--”  
  
“ _No_ ,” Leonard says, whacking him on the shoulder, because his lust for Leonard’s not-yet-wife is deeply disturbing. “We have to stay, because I didn’t go with Jocelyn that night. I don’t want to mess anything up.”  
  
“This is your brain, Len, not a sci fi movie. We can do whatever we want.”  
  
“Maybe _you_ can, because it’s not your memory.” Just then the swinging door cracks open and the smoke-roughened voice of Leonard’s mother yells, “Leonard! Put the brie in the oven, will you?”  
  
Leonard grabs a tray and starts to comply, but it turns to water in his hands. It’s all winking out: the skewered scallops and the bruschetta and the wheel of brie. Leonard grabs onto Jim in sudden panic, afraid he’ll wink out too.  
  
“He found us! Now where do we go?”  
  
“I don’t know, I-- _oww_ not so hard. How about--ummm...”  
  
“ _Now_ , Jim!”  
  
“How about an embarrassing memory? Something he won’t think you’d want me to see.”  
  
 _Oh, wonderful_. Leonard has plenty of those. “Okay, give me a minute.”  
  
It’s late at night and Leonard is in his father’s study, sitting at his desk, bathed in the pale blue glow from his father’s beloved Apple computer. Leonard’s allowed to use it for homework and nothing else, as his mother has learned from her friends at the raquet club that The Internet is Bad.  
  
“A Power Mac? Are you shitting me?” says Jim at his shoulder. “ _Sweeet_. Can we take it back with us?”  
  
Leonard doesn’t answer, because he’s feeling sweaty and itchy in his flannel pajamas, all too aware of what’s going on on the screen.  
  
The image fills in line by excruciating line: First, gelled dark hair, and then limpid brown eyes and slightly parted lips with a hint of tongue visible.  
  
“Oh, _awesome_ ,” Jim whispers.  
  
Next comes the beefy torso with a tiny tank top hiked up to reveal chiseled abs, brown and shiny as a Thanksgiving turkey. Finally--accompanied by frenzied flashing of Dr. McCoy’s 28.8 modem--six inches of blue-veined erection, clutched like a stick shift.  
  
“It’s _porn_!” Jim crows in delight. “Low-res gay porn! You were a pioneer, man!” He tries to give Leonard a fist bump.  
  
Leonard can’t respond because of what his own hand is doing. He wants to stop; he’s mortified both inside the memory and out, but he can’t stop now any more than he could then, fueled by hormones and craven need, so humiliating but so _good_ in its own way, the shame salty-sweet like the sweat beginning to drip down his face--  
  
“Sorry,” Jim says, lowering his voice and stifling a snicker. “But if this is your idea of embarrassment--I mean, _everybody_ \--”  
  
At that precise moment, Dr. McCoy the Elder pushes open his study door, having come downstairs to get a shot of brandy to “settle his stomach” and glimpses the pale blue light under the door.  
  
“Len? Are you on the computer ag--” Dr. McCoy freezes, trying to take in the sight of his honor student son jerking off to gay porn in the chair where he does his taxes.  
  
“Oh,” Dr. McCoy says faintly, raising a hand to shield his eyes, as if the porn is a fiery sun. “Well, don’t stay up too late, you have school tomorrow.”  
  
The door closes, and Jim--who’s been holding his breath the whole time--collapses with laughter.  
  
“ _Shit_ ,” he gasps, “you poor, poor kid. What did he do to you the next day?”  
  
“Nothing. I think he probably erased it from his memory.” Leonard’s retrospective boner is, of course, down for the count. “Not literally, of course.”  
  
“Of course not; that’s impossible.” Jim wipes his eyes and Leonard starts to relax, just in time for the room to smear around him into the by now familiar swirl of incipient nothingness. The Power Mac pops out of existence.  
  
“What now?” Leonard begs, clutching at Jim. “Where to next?”  
  
“I don’t know. I think we’re fucked.” Already, Jim’s voice sounds far away.  
  
+++++  
  
They’re back on the beach now, and it’s late at night. The palms sway eerie and black against the star-dotted sky. They’re walking, hand in hand, and Jim decides he wants to check out one of the fancy beach homes. It’s accessible by a long, wooden walkway that protects the dunes from their feet.  
  
“I like this,” Jim says, looking at the white facade. “It’s traditional but it’s not all cutesy steamboats-and-pecan-pie. I love the porches. If this were my house I’d sleep on the porch every night if the weather was decent.” He tugs on Leonard’s hand. “C’mon, let’s go in.”  
  
“What do you mean, _go in_?”  
  
“Into the house.” Before Leonard can stop him, Jim’s peering in through the glass that frames the from door. “It’s okay, nobody’s home. And there’s no alarm. That I can see.”  
  
“Jim, don’t--” Leonard sounds whiny to his own ears. “C’mon, this isn’t my idea of fun.” Leonard’s got a decent moral compass but also a teenaged fear of doing wrong and _getting caught_.  
  
Jim takes his peevishness kindly. “We wouldn’t have been caught, you know. The owners were probably hundreds of miles away; their neighbors, too. Don’t you want to see what would have happened, if we’d gone in?”  
  
Leonard understands; it may be their last chance. “Yeah, I guess. Okay.”  
  
Jim rifles in his backpack and pulls out a multitool with which he makes short work of the lock. Even now, Leonard mostly doesn’t want to know where he got that skill.  
  
The door opens with a click and Jim waves him in, ceremonious. The outside floodlights are just enough for Leonard to make out oceans of white carpet, sofas littered with plump pillows, sleek surfaces of glass and granite.  
  
“Not bad,” Jim says. “How do you like our house, Len?”  
  
“It isn’t ours,” Leonard starts to say, but Jim shakes his head.  
  
“It’s ours for tonight. Next stop: liquor cabinet.”  
  
“Don’t--” Too late, of course. Jim’s found it with the speed of a bloodhound and is pouring the each a couple of fingers of single-malt Scotch.  
  
“Sit down,” he says. “Relax. Or aren’t you physically capable of it?”  
  
“I _want_ to,” Leonard says. “I want to live in the moment like you do. But I’m not you. My mind always injects the worst possible scenario: there’s a silent alarm and the police are on their way. The plane will crash on our way to the exotic island. I’ll lose my job because you wanted to give me a hummer in the exam room.”  
  
Jim leans forward, elbows on knees, looking hopelessly at home in a stylish, overstuffed chair that isn’t his. Leonard wishes with all his heart that he could give Jim everything he deserves--a beautiful home and world travel and adventurous sex every moment of the day.  
  
“I’m sorry, but I can’t help you,” Jim says. “I don’t have any answers. I’m not some force of nature sent to blast you out of your humdrum existence. I can’t use magic, liberating sex to make you love and accept yourself. I’m just a guy with a lot of baggage, like you, trying to figure out how I’m going to get out of bed tomorrow morning.”  
  
Leonard can’t make Jim happy, either. He can’t even hang onto this. Already, the walls are shaking, as if buffeted by hurricane winds.  
  
“God damn it,” he says, and feels like crying.  
  
“It’s okay.” Jim reaches out to stroke his face. “Everything comes to an end, sooner or later.” A huge crack forms in the wall behind him, and a window blows out.  
  
“Well, aren’t just a ray of sunshine?” He catches Jim’s hand and holds it. “Would things have been any different? If I’d broken into the house with you?”  
  
“Yes. No. Maybe.” He smiles at Leonard--such a beautiful smile. “I don’t know. But it would have been fun.” Chunks are falling off the house now; the porch that Jim admired crashes silently to the sand.  
  
“What are we going to do, Jim? I don’t want to lose you.”  
  
The ground under Leonard trembles and flies apart, atoms winking out. A voice, almost too faint to hear, says, “Meet me in Greensboro--”  
  
+++++  
  
Valentine’s Day is a miserable excuse for a holiday, and nothing is worse than spending it visibly alone. Dr. M’Benga’s day-long electronic medical records extravaganza--while both salutary and boring--is also the perfect opportunity for everyone who knows me casually to ask if I have _Plans_. I do not have _Plans_ , unless you count getting buzzed and greasy on a six-pack of Georgia Brown and a pound of teriyaki wings.  
  
However, there’s no avoiding it. Telling myself that gets me as far as the on-ramp to I-75, at which point I decide to go north, not south, and end up in the Ocalee National Forest, getting stares from day hikers who wonder why I’m wearing a blazer and dress slacks.  
  
I’m hungry, but I’ve used up my store of adventure for the day, so I go to a Waffle House and drink black coffee until my nerves are tuned like a grand piano, until I can _feel_ rather see than see the pretty blond boy with the backpack decide to envelop me in his sphere of chaos.  
  
He drags me off to Tybee Island, and we spend a mostly platonic night dozing and talking about the sports we played as kids, our favorite board games. When dawn comes, it isn’t a golden revelatory spectacle, it’s hazy and gray. I try to be a gentleman and drop him at home, and he somehow ends up at my place instead.  
  
Everything fades to gray and two weeks later, we’re sitting on my couch eating fish tacos from Rubio’s.  
  
“These aren’t bad,” I say, not caring that my mouth is full, “but the fish is a little dry. They should really marinade it first so it can hold up to the grilling. There’s this place--”  
  
“--In Panama City,” Jim says, without missing a beat. “Yeah, I know; you talk about it all the fucking time. You get these things into your head and you’re like a dog with a bone. You’d rather bitch about how they could be perfect instead of--” he grinds to a halt, and then starts waving his hands like he’s fanning away moths. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. This just feels _weird_. I feel like I know everything you’re going to say and do but not in, like, a good way. It’s like you’re my brother or something. I mean, I’d love to go surfing in California, but if I suggest it, you’re going to say--”  
  
“That there’s perfectly good surfing in Florida, and the California breaks are too crowded?”  
  
“Exactly.” He looks so disconsolate that I feel bad for him, until I reflect that I’m the one being dumped. “I’m sorry,” he says again, and though I’m usually the first one to assign blame, I can’t think of one thing he did wrong. “This isn’t working for me.”  
  
“It’s okay,” I say, taking a deep, resigned breath of _it’s for the best_. “At least stay and eat your tacos. They’re actually pretty good.”  
  
+++++  
  
Jim’s absence is a pain and a relief. I do some trail running, and I work, and I hang out with Janice and Christine. Christine is trying to convince their landlord to let her raise chickens in the backyard. Janice has already picked out the names.  
  
I come home from work one evening and find a cream-colored, official-looking letter with my name handwritten on the front. Long experience with lawyers makes me open it with trepidation. It says:  
  
 _Dear Dr. McCoy,  
  
According to our records, you have received treatment at the Ji Yi Institute. Please be informed that these treatments were not approved by the governing body of the VSA and may have unexpected consequences. Please contact our office for information on reparative therapy and a refund of the $2000 which our records show you paid.  
_  
  
I’ve got no idea what the Ji Yi Institute or the VSA are, but as it happens, I _am_ missing $2000 that was mysteriously transferred out of my bank account a few weeks ago (I know what people think about doctors’ salaries, but I noticed).  
  
I’m still reading over the letter trying to figure out what the hell it means when my cell rings. It’s Jim.  
  
“ _Heeey. Um, I’m sorry if this is weird, but--did you receive a letter from something called the Ji Yi Institute?_ ”  
  
“I’m looking at it right now.”  
  
A pause. “ _Do you have any idea what it’s about? Do you think it’s a scam?_ ”  
  
“I have no idea. Do you want to check it out?”  
  
“ _Yeah, I think we should._ ”  
  
I call the number in the letter to set up an appointment, and two days later Jim and I, in awkward alliance, are standing in from of a squat brick building on Tidewater Avenue. There’s no sign, just a sticky spot where one might recently have been.  
  
The man who greets us has a long, angular face like a Roman senator. He’s wearing a pale gray tunic and an incongruous black Fedora.  
  
“Please come in,” he says, not introducing himself.  
  
The spiel that follows is as unbelievable as it is strangely familiar. Apparently, Jim and I both decided to pay some huckster $2000 to erase our memories of each other, and it worked. Or mostly worked, which would explain why I spent our very brief relationship feeling like Jim was responsible for the red wine stain on my sofa, even though it’s been there for more than a year.  
  
“Your memories were transferred to me,” says the long-faced man, “though I assure you I have not attempted to access them. I can transfer them back to you, or you may remain as you are. It is unlikely that there is any physical damage.” He hands us each an envelope. “Here is your currency.” I’d dearly love to know who he is, why he talks like a Victorian schoolmaster, and how any of this even possible. But I notice that Jim is looking a bit pale and unusually serious.  
  
“Can we each get back our own memories?” he says.  
  
“I fear not,” the man says. “They are too deeply entwined. You will receive your joint memories, as well as individual memories concerning each other.”  
  
There’s a long pause during which I assume Jim is trying to figure out the worst thing he could possibly have said about me or done to me in the past year, because I’m sure as hell doing it myself.  
  
“Okay,” Jim says finally. “I’ll do it. How bad can it be?”  
  
He’s never been divorced, so he has no idea. But it seems unfair to burden him alone, plus I confess I’m curious as hell.  
  
“What the hey, I’m in, too.”  
  
The long-faced man nods and extends a hand to each of us. “Please place your hands on mine.” It seems ridiculously simple, like a _Pull my finger_ joke, but he’s clearly not the type.  
  
Reality gives an uneasy lurch, and then my memories and Jim’s are spooling across my inner eyes like a DVR on fast forward.  
  
 _  
….Leonard is having lunch with Christine in the staff dining room at the hospital. “He spent the entire weekend trying to restring a guitar he got off Freecycle, but when I asked him to fix the shower head, he was ‘too busy.’ He could have pulled extra shifts at the shop and _bought_ a guitar in the time he spent, but God forbid I should mention it, because then I’m a stuffy old man who’s angry at life and sabotaging his creativity and Lord knows what all. But he’s got so much _ potential _\--isn’t it a compliment that I think he’s capable of so much more than he’s doing?”...  
  
“….He has this beautiful flat-screen TV, but he only watches science shows and _ House _.” Jim is lying on his back and trying to loosen a balky derailleur while talking to his co-worker Blake. “And he only watches_ that _because it pisses him off. He doesn’t shut up the whole time, just rants about how implausible everything is and how a real doctor like that would lose his license and how if the residents were really that stupid there’d be patients dying left and right....”  
  
….“And the minute I say anything, it’s like I’ve grown horns and turned into his parents. Who I know nothing about, by the way, because he refuses to talk about them. I _ want _to be his boyfriend and not his father, but somebody has to be the responsible party, and he makes damn sure it’s always me, and then he resents the hell out of me for it. Especially if I point out that building a giant octopus out of LEGO does not pay the cable bill....”  
  
“….He doesn’t realize that except for the limp, he _ is _House. Everyone else at the hospital is a lazy shit-for-brains who couldn’t diagnose their way out of a paper bag except him. It’s no wonder he doesn’t have any friends at work except for this one nurse who must have the patience of a saint. Does it sound like the guy I’m talking about is over 60? Because he’s still in his early 30s. I think he was born 45. Maybe he’s aging backward....”  
_  
  
When I open my eyes, the long-faced man is gone, perhaps to save us embarrassment. I flick a quick glance at Jim, unable to meet his eyes, and see that his pale face is sunburn pink. I feel bad for the long-faced man; what a terrible curse it would be to always know what other people are thinking about you, especially those you love.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Jim mumbles, staring at his hands. “I didn’t realize I’m so annoying. No wonder I drive you crazy.”  
  
“You don’t. A lot of things do, but you’re not even in the Top 10.” That gets him to at least look at me. “Why would you? You’re damn near perfect.”  
  
“It wouldn’t change, you know,” he says, as if we’ve been having a long, well-reasoned argument. “If we got back together. I’m probably not going to go back to school, and I’ll keep jumping around from thing to thing and coming over to your place to watch TV because I forgot to pay the cable bill. And you’ll stay in your little bubble and bitch about how I and everybody else is failing to live up to your expectations, even though _you_ stick with what you’re already good at and don’t push your boundaries.”  
  
“Okay,” I say.  
  
“What?”  
  
“Okay. That’s okay.” And it really is.  
  
“Okay,” he says back to me, and breaks into a grin. For once in my life, it’s seems I’ve surprised him.  
  
+++++  
  
On the beach at Tybee Island, a near-gale is blowing, rain coming from every direction like tiny bullets. Even the seagulls have packed it in; they’re on the shore with their wings folded tight, and there’s not a human to be seen except Jim. His jacket’s unzipped and his hair is plastered to his head, and I should really yell at him to keep his clothes dry, but I don’t.  
  
Jim is laughing, and that’s all that matters.

**Author's Note:**

> Note: The title is ganked from the same poem as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: Alexander Pope’s “Eloisa to Abelard.” 
> 
> Of all affliction taught a lover yet,  
> 'Tis sure the hardest science to forget!  
> How shall I lose the sin, yet keep the sense,  
> And love th' offender, yet detest th' offence?


End file.
